AMC Renews Hell on Wheels for Season 2

Fans of Cullen Bohannan rejoice: AMC has renewed their Western TV show “Hell on Wheels” for a second season. This, despite dipping ratings since the show’s muscular premiere, thanks to, of course, its lead-in, the network’s monster hit “The Walking Dead”, which has since gone hiatus until 2012. Apparently this is the cable net’s fifth show to get a second year, with only the puzzler “Rubicon” not passing muster.

“Hell on Wheels” stars Anson Mount as a trigger-happy former Confederate soldier who is warpathing his way through the country in search of his wife’s killers. He ends up working for railroad tycoon Durant (“Star Trek’s” Colm Meaney) during his vendetta, meets a bunch of colorful folks, one of which is the beautiful Lily Bell (played by the beautiful Dominique McElligott), the show’s eventual love interest for our taciturn hero, I presume.

I’m a big fan of Westerns, and there are a lot of good things in “Hell on Wheels” (the production value is excellent), but it’s probably saying something that I ended up fast-forwarding through a lot of the show’s recent episodes. There are still parts of the show that intrigue me — Bohannan’s growing relationship with Lily, Durant’s obsession to build the railroad — and parts that just bores me to tears — the bible thumpers, the Indians, the racist Irishmen, and just about anything to do with singer turned actor Common’s character.

Honestly, I haven’t a clue where creators/producers Joe and Tony Gayton will go in the second season, or how they’re going to justify Bohannan still working for Durant while, one presumes, his wife’s killers roam the countryside free. You’d think he might get farther along on his revenge quest if he wasn’t taken up with, you know, that whole building the transcontinental railroad stuff…